


The Resident Patient

by Soledad



Series: The Adventures of a Consulting Time Lord [2]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle, Torchwood
Genre: Android Anthea, Gen, Immortal Ianto Jones, Scientist Mike, Sidekick Mike, Story: The Adventure of the Resident Patient, The Adventures of a Consulting Time Lord, Time Lord Mycroft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-09
Updated: 2015-08-16
Packaged: 2018-04-15 00:42:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 17,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4586466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Soledad/pseuds/Soledad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first true case of the consulting Time Lord calls him to aid Mike Stamford with the mysterius death of his resident patient. Rewrite of the canon ACD story in modern settings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Police

**Author's Note:**

> The case Lestrade & Co. are working on is very loosely based on the classic ACD story “The Resident Patient”. Also, Donovan and Anderson are as they appeared in the original “Sherlock” pilot: Sally as a uniformed cop and Anderson with beard and glasses. What can I say? I liked his beard and glasses.

THE POLICE

Detective Inspector Gregory Lestrade was beyond frustrated. His team of dedicated professionals had been working on this bizarre case for weeks but they didn’t seem to make any headway at all. Three suicides in a fortnight. Three people had hanged themselves in their respective closed rooms, and while the individual cases appeared simple enough, there was something decidedly fishy about the whole thing.

His gut told him so much; even if his mind insisted that he was imagining things.

Those three people had no apparent reason to kill themselves. They’d all been reasonably healthy and didn’t seem to have any financial problems, if their living conditions were any indication… well, save this last one. Plus, neither of them had left a note, which was unusual. As clichéd as it sounded, people _loved_ to leave a note, for some reason. Statistically, at least two of those three should have left one. And yet there had been none.

The chilly, wet October weather did nothing to lift the Detective Inspector’s mood. Through the half-drawn blinds of the victim’s bleak little living room he could see the rain falling slowly, steadily, making the asphalt shine with the reflected light of the street lanterns. It was a singularly unpleasant evening as only London weather could make it, discouraging the inhabitants of Baker Street to leave their houses… unless something truly exciting happened.

Well, a hanged man in a closed room seemed exciting enough to attract a small crowd of gaffers that elbowed each other out of the way in their attempt to get closer and probably catch a glimpse of… _something_. Not that _that_ chance would ever come. Sergeant Donovan, on the verge of her promotion to plain-clothes detective, which would finally spare her such mundane duties, was patrolling the police tape, keeping everyone out of the crime scene.

Anyone who’d try to get by her would be taught to think again within moments. Sally Donovan wasn’t a woman who let people get away with _anything_.

The water was flowing in rivulets down that ridiculous yellow jacket she was forced to wear for her own safety. She endured it stoically. Once her promotion had gone through the mills of bureaucracy, which was only a matter of weeks now, she’d be able to discard the unflattering uniform and wear sensible clothes again.

Lestrade smiled fondly. If anyone, Donovan had more than deserved a promotion. She was sharp, hard-working and stubborn like a mule, even if a little abrasive; never took anything for face value. She’d make an excellent detective one day – with a bit more experience and diplomacy.

His thoughts were interrupted by Anderson, their forensics expert, coming from the victim’s bedroom, wearing one of those paper coveralls SOCO always would at a crime scene. For a moment, Lestrade was distracted by the man’s recently-grown beard that looked bizarrely fake, despite the fact that it was the genuine item, and the ugly, horn-rimmed glasses Anderson was currently wearing.

Lost one of his contact lenses again, presumably.

“Does the scene match the previous two?” Lestrade asked, and Anderson nodded.

“I suppose we can say that,” he allowed reluctantly. “The door was locked from within. No marks on the body – at least none that would suggest the contribution of another person to his demise – and no identification.”

“Same as the others then,” Lestrade summarized sourly. “Exactly the same. Have you learned anything from the neighbours?”

Anderson shook his head. “Not much. The flat is owned by an elderly widow by the name of Mrs. Dorothea Hudson. She owns two flats in this row; and while she generally has boarders in 221B – though not at the moment – this was the first time she’d managed to rent out 221C… which is not really surprising,” he added, looking around in the bleak, dank, barely furnished flat in disgust.

“And she won’t be able to do so again for a while,” Lestrade said. “While most people like murder mysteries, few of them would want to rent a place where somebody’s killed himself.”

“I think the place alone would achieve that,” Anderson muttered. “Who the hell would want to live in a damp basement?”

Lestrade ignored him. “What could the old lady say about her boarder?” he asked instead.

Anderson shrugged. “Sally spoke to her. You know, the female touch and all that. She’s much better with witnesses. ‘Specially with old women.”

Lestrade suppressed a sigh. The on/off affair of Anderson and Donovan was a well enough kept secret at the New Scotland Yard – he supposed that nobody else knew about it – but that didn’t mean that he, as a family man, would condone it. He felt sorry for Anderson’s wife, a small, bird-like woman, always on some cure or another due to her generally weak health; and besides, he always thought Donovan could have done better.

He went to the open window and yelled out into the rain. “Donovan! Get up here at once!”

To her credit, Donovan was up in record time. She even produced her small notebook without being asked. She was an old-fashioned one who’d still take hand-written notes.

“Mrs. Hudson says the victim has rented 221C less than three weeks ago,” she began to read in a crisp, professional voice. “He said he was a Russian and needed a cheap place to stay while his elderly father was under medical treatment, which apparently ate up all their money. He spoke English fluently, but with a slight lisp. Mrs. Hudson couldn’t tell if his accent was a genuine Russian one or faked, but she admitted that she wasn’t very good at recognising accents. Other than that, the young man was rarely at home, which he explained with the need of staying at his father’s side in _King’s College Hospital_ as much as possible. He also generally avoided any contact with his landlady or the lodgers in 221B… well, as long as there were any.”

“Hmmm,” Lestrade mulled over the rather sparse amount of data. “Did she tell you the victim’s name? He must have filled out a rental contract.”

“That she did,” Donovan said with a wry smile. “Apparently, the young man was called Illya Kuryakin.”

“And _that_ ,” Lestrade declared triumphantly, “is most certainly a lie.”

Anderson, who never watched the telly – hadn’t done so even as a child – looked at the Detective Inspector in confusion. “How can you be so sure about that?”

“Because Illya Kuryakin doesn’t exist,” Lestrade explained. “You’re probably too young to remember, but that was the name of one of the leads in a 1960s TV-series about two spies,” he looked at Donovan. ”It surprises me that _you_ ’d know, honestly.”

“My aunt was a die-hard _Man For UNCLE-fan_ ,” Donovan replied, grinning. “Used to have a mad crush on Illya, too. I think I’ve watched every single episode at least twice while she was babysitting me.”

“There were worse programmes,” Lestrade shrugged. “In any case, we now have the proof that something doesn’t add up with these suicides,” he took out his phone and hit SpeedDial #5.

Anderson gave him a reproachful look. “You’re not phoning _him_ , are you?” he demanded. “Because we can handle this. We can _absolutely_ handle it.”

Lestrade was in no mood to argue with him. “You’ve got your work to do, right? Then do it, and let _me_ do mine,” he only got the mailbox, of course; not that he’d expect anything else. “This is Detective Inspector Lestrade. Please call me when you get this. We’re gonna need you.”

“ _Need_ him?” Anderson scoffed. “What for? That bloody freak doesn’t even show his face around a crime scene – just keeps sending you idiotic text messages.”

“Messages that tend to supply us with the necessary clues to solve our cases,” Lestrade replied. “Besides, I’ve got the feeling that this time he’s gonna make an exception. Seal the crime scene when you’re done here, and send the body to _St. Bart’s_. He might want to see it.”

Anderson didn’t deign him with an answer; just turned around in demonstrative disgust and went to continue his investigation in the victim’s bedroom.

~TBC~


	2. Encounter at Bart's

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, there’s some creative use of Classic!Who characters – not all of it canon. I use them as they fit this particular AU, all right? ;))

**ENCOUNTER AT BART’S**

As usual, forensic pathologist Molly Hooper arrived to work early. She liked the silent calm of the morgue before anyone else would arrive. Others might find her preferences morbid, but Molly was a shy and introspective soul. She felt overwhelmed and even a little intimidated by the fast pace and general loudness of modern life.

The morgue was her perfect place to hide from that. Even her colleagues at Bart’s avoided going there if they could. Sometimes she thought her late birth had been a temporal glitch; that she should have been born at least a century earlier.

Due to her solitary nature, she didn’t socialise much with her colleagues, Mike Stamford being the only exception. Good old Mike, with his eternal struggle to secure enough research time for himself between juggling teaching with research and with his tiny little private practice at 403 Brook Street that he’d only started a year or so ago.

Dear old Mike with that child-like crush on her.

Sometimes she felt just a little guilty for not being able to return Mike’s feelings. He was such a nice bloke, really: always willing to help whatever might have come up, always ready with a compliment to boost her low self-confidence. But she couldn’t help herself. Mike just wasn’t the kind of man that would quicken her pulse.

She liked her men tall, dark and mysterious.

She readily admitted being a hopeless romantic. It was all Gran Victoria’s fault, really. Maman, as she’d been called by her numerous children and grandchildren, used to read fantastic tales to her little ones from an old, hand-written book with ink-drawn illustrations that had looked very much like a diary. Tales about a strange, Chaplinesque man travelling in a blue police box through space and time, accompanied by a young Scottish warrior from the eighteenth century and a Victorian girl who tended to scream a lot.

Tales about their encounters with awesome creatures, both on Earth and on other planets, most of them not even human and some of them downright frightening.

The tales had all been written in first person. Just like a diary, really, and they had a certain Victorian flair in style. Molly often wondered who the author might have been and what had become of the book after Maman’s death some six or seven years ago. Had it been discharged with the rest of her stuff or had someone taken it as a reminder of a happy childhood?

She shook her head in melancholy. She missed Maman more than anyone else. More even than her father who’d perished at Canary Wharf, although the two of them had always had a very close, loving relationship. Her father had been the one to wake her interest in forensics, and here she was, still doing it – and at Bart’s, no less! Dad would be pleased.

Well, it was time to stop remembering and start working. She put on a fresh lab coat and switched on her computer to see which new cases would call for her attention. If there was any urgent murder case or if she could finally start on those mysterious suicides that had been waiting for their turn for a fortnight or for a week, respectively.

Her eyes widened as she was reading the data of a new suicide the victim of which had been brought in last night. Another one? Caucasian male, approximately thirty to thirty-five years, six feet two tall, weight approximately a hundred or ninety pounds, dark hair, dark eyes, pale complexion, high muscle density – this bloke had to be a Hercules while still alive!

She scrolled down for the personal facts and couldn’t believe her eyes. Supposed name… Illya Kuryakin? Was this somebody’s idea of a stupid joke?

“Apparently so,” a deep baritone voice said from the open door, making her realise that she’d been talking loudly to herself. Again. How embarrassing.

“That, or a spectacularly idiotic attempt of making people believe he was a Russian while, in truth, he was obviously not,” the beautiful voice continued, speaking faster and faster with practically every new word. “No surprise here; most people are idiots. Now, can you tell me something about the manner of this man’s death?”

Molly blinked, trying to follow the rapid-fire speech of he unknown man who now strode into her autopsy room confidently, as if he owned the place, with Mike Stamford hovering behind him, wearing a white lab coat and an amused expression.

The man was very tall, whipcord thin, probably in his mid-thirties, with a pale, patrician face of angular features, an unruly mass of ginger curls covering his sleek head and the most amazing eyes she’d ever seen. They were large, slightly slanted under the wide arch of dark eyebrows, and of a strangely luminous grey-green.

Molly was hypnotised by them, like a little bird by the unblinking glare of a snake. She could feel her cheeks warming in embarrassment, and she knew she was probably beet red by now. She was also getting a little angry.

“Who are you and what are you doing in my morgue?” she demanded when she found her voice again.

The man rolled those incredible eyes. “Oh, c’mon on, how would it be your morgue? Unless you own the hospital, which I’m sure you don’t – based on your clothes, all simple mass production, purchased in one of the common warehouses, most likely Marks & Spencer if I’m not mistaken, which I rarely am – this is still the morgue of Bart’s and you’re merely an employee, so you’ve got no claim on this place.”

“Sherlock!” Mike interrupted while Molly just stood there, completely flabbergasted, not quite sure whether she should be amazed or insulted. “Breathe! Don’t take it personally, love,” he added for Molly. “He’s like that to everyone. Which probably explains his extreme lack of popularity with the police… well, actually with almost everyone.”

“I don’t aspire to win popularity points with idiots,” the man scoffed. “Now, would you get over the formalities so that we could finally get on with the Work?”

For some reason Molly had the weird feeling that “work” had been really meant with a capital W.

“Oh, all right,” Mike replied with a long-suffering sigh; then he made a vague gesture in the man’s direction. “Molly, love, this is Sherlock Holmes. He works with the police on the suicide case as a consultant and has been given permission to use the labs here for his experiments. Sherlock, meet Molly Harper; she’s our best forensic pathologists here.”

“Charmed,” the man – Sherlock – said impatiently, his tone making painfully clear that he was not the least charmed by a little grey mouse like Molly, and why should he? With his devastating good looks he was probably highly sought after by the ladies of high society and his tailored suit spoke of wealth; a lot of it. Hadn’t the Homes estate provided the great majority of the funds that had been necessary to save Bart’s, back in 2006?

“Now, if we could perhaps drop the social niceties and do what’s important, we might even achieve some results,” Sherlock continued. As Molly was still more than a little stunned, he sighed impatiently. “When has competence become such a rare thing in this country?”

“Sherlock, you wouldn’t even _recognise_ social niceties if they hit you upside the head,” Mike said tolerantly; for some reason he appeared to like this odd, arrogant man. “Well, I’ve got students to torture, so I’ll leave you to your competent work. Play nice, kids.”

And with that he left indeed, and Molly found herself alone with the man that would profoundly change her life. She just had no way to know yet how profoundly.

~TBC~


	3. The Landlady

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mrs Hudson’s Whoniverse identity might be revealed later. Until then, you’re free to guess. *g* Also, in the unaired pilot the bar is genuinely called “Mrs Hudson’s Snack and Sarnies”. I kid you not! It only became “Speedy’s” in the final version.

**THE LANDLADY**

Mrs. Dorothea Hudson was slowly getting desperate. Buying 221 Baker Street hadn’t turned out quite the old age insurance she’d thought it would. Why, it had only been three weeks since she’d managed to get rid of that _very_ unpleasant young man with the unacceptable smoking and drinking habits… not to mention his lady friend who tried to run her own questionable business (of carnal nature) from the same flat.

_Her_ flat, the one into which she’d put so much work and love to make it a good home for someone who would deserve it.

Sometimes she _really_ envied Mrs Turner and her married ones next door. Sure, in her youth you wouldn’t even _think_ of two gentlemen getting legally married, but at least Mrs. Turner’s boys were polite, mild-mannered and very, _very_ fastidious.

Polly had always been better at making the right choices.

And then there was the dreadful business with pour young Mr. Kuryakin killing himself in 221C. The first time she’d managed to rent out that horrible flat, and it only lasted a couple of weeks. Now it would remain empty for good, she feared. It wasn’t very appealing to begin with, and knowing that a man had been hanged in it would frighten all potential lodgers away.

Oh, this was such a mess! Ever since she’d had to give up her little business – the sandwich bar on the ground level – due to her arthritic hip, things seemed to be worsening steadily. The large sign advertising _Mrs Hudson’s Snack and Sarnies_ was still up above the entrance, but the new owner was already busy at redecorating and modernising the place.

Her heart clenched every time she looked at it. Giving up the bar had been hard, but she’d had no other choice. She might still be able to cook for herself or bake the one or other tin of biscuits whenever she invited Mrs. Turner for tea, but running a bar on her own, even if such a small one, was out of the question. She could call herself fortunate that the bloody hip didn’t bother her more; she’d learned to live with the moderate pain, and her herbal soothers worked well enough.

But giving up the bar meant another cut into her modest income, and with both flats currently standing empty she feared that she’d be forced to use up her savings (such as they were in these times) to help her over the period of financial draught.

Really, ever since she’d made the mistake of marrying that horrible man and following him to the States, things had been on a downward spiral for her. Her first husband, a journalist, had lived for his work and died due to crossing the wrong people (she had no idea what UNIT was and why her James had wanted to investigate them, and frankly, she didn’t care), but at least he’d been a decent chap.

The second one, though… she shivered from the memory of having married such a monster. How could she have been such a fool, to fall for Francis Cleary’s compliments and promises? How could she not realise that he’d been insane? Had she not been so lonely after dear James’s death…

She couldn’t understand Mrs. Turner, she really couldn’t. The woman used to have a decent husband, one that even her posh family had found suitable, and yet she’d left him for her old lover, that uncouth sailor! All right, granted, her sailor had proven quite the social climber, becoming an Admiral and whatnot, but he was still a Cockney who’d grown up near a brewery. He was not the right match for the daughter of a name-worthy scientist, who’d been raised in a big, old mansion in the countryside.

And yet Mrs. Turner would even become estranged from her only son over this relationship. It was silly and irresponsible, really. It clearly showed that Mrs. Turner had no idea what loneliness truly was.

Mrs. Hudson always regretted not having any children. With dear James, they had wanted to wait. Until he’d make a name for himself. Until he’d have a steady job, instead of working freelance. Until it was too late.

With her second husband, she figured out soon enough what kind of man she’d married and dreaded the thought of bringing a copy of him into the world. Thank goodness, _he_ didn’t want any children; otherwise he might have forced her.

Fortunately, he’d been caught and sentenced to death in Florida some ten years ago. And what was even more fortunate, Mr. Holmes had used his connections to ensure that he would be in fact executed, despite his elusive insanity, so that she could return to England. To London, which had always been her only true home.

As she had been proven innocent in her second husband’s hideous crimes, she could keep her part of their funds (in which, again, she suspected Mr. Holmes’s influence), but those funds were small and the future uncertain.

She wiped her eyes and was about to turn away from the window and put on the kettle for her much-needed afternoon tea when she spotted somebody approaching her house. It was a tall, dark-haired young man in an expensive, three-piece pinstriped suit. An elegant black car – presumably the one in which he’d come – was parked right in front of the house. He went directly to the door of 221B and rang the bell.

Her hopes renewed, Mrs. Hudson hurried down to answer the door and was pleased to get a closer look of that smooth, almost child-like face. That button nose was particularly cute, she found. Only the calm, blue-grey eyes didn’t match the rest of the picture. They were too old and careworn to belong in such a youthful face; as if the visitor had already seen too much in his young life.

“Mrs. Dorothea Hudson?” he asked in a mellow voice that had a distinctive Welsh lilt to it. She nodded.

“That I am. What can I do for you, Mr…” she trailed off expectantly, and he caught her drift at once.

“The name is Jones, Mrs. Hudson,” he supplied. “Ianto Jones.”

“You’re Welsh, aren’t you?” Mrs. Hudson was warming to him immediately. Such a nice, well-groomed boy he was, with such pleasant manners, it would be a delight to have him around. “Are you interested in renting one of the flats, then?”

Ianto Jones smiled, and that made Mrs. Hudson’s heart melt in her chest just a little. She wished she had a son like him.

“In a manner, yes,” he replied apologetically. “Not for myself, though.”

“Oh!” her heart dropped in disappointment. He must have realised it, because he gave her another one of those slow, sly smiles.

“Actually, I’m here on behalf of Mr. Holmes,” he explained. “I work for him; and he’d like you to take his younger brother as a boarder. He’s willing to supply part of the rent, as Sherlock hasn’t got full access to his funds yet.”

“Oh, of course I’ll take him!” her mood brightened again, remembering the strange, brilliant young man who’d helped her in the deepest crisis of her life. “I’ll even make him a good price. I owe that boy so much! If not for him, I’d never been freed from that terrible husband of mine.”

“It won’t be easy, though,” Ianto warned her. “He’s a most eccentric person of decidedly odd habits, of which playing the violin in the oddest hours of the night is just the most harmless one. _And_ Mr. Holmes would require to be informed in the moment his brother might have a relapse into his drug using habit.”

“Don’t worry about that, my boy,” she said, delighted to be able to do something for those whom she owed her late chance to a normal life. “I’m sure I can deal with Sherlock. A bit of tender little care can get you a long way. Now, why don’t you come in and have a cuppa with me? I was just about to put the kettle on, and I still have some of the ginger biscuits I baked yesterday.”

“I don’t want to be a nuisance,” he began politely, but Mrs. Hudson cut him in the word.

“Nonsense. You look like someone in need of a bit of pampering yourself. Besides, tea always tastes better when shared.”

She turned around, determined to wait on the bringer of good news, and Ianto Jones obediently followed her into her little saloon, ready to be pampered.

~TBC~


	4. The Resident Patient

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As the chapter title reveals, we are dealing with events from the original ACD story here. However, there are considerable changes.

**THE RESIDENT PATIENT**

Sherlock was still working in the forensic labs of _Bart’s_ late in the evening when Mike Stamford burst in, clearly agitated.

“I need your help,” he declared without preamble. “Somebody might have broken into my house.”

“Call the police,” Sherlock replied without looking up from his microscope. “I don’t waste my time on dull cases.”

“No, no, you don’t understand!” Mike protested. “It’s not my rooms that have been… well, _probably_ have been… erm… _visited_ without invitation, but those of my resident patient.”

“What, did they steal his bedpan or his crutches?” Sherlock asked in a bored tone, eyes still glued to his microscope.

God, why did people insist to bother him with their mundane little problems? Didn’t they realise that he had much more important things to do?

“No,” Mike said grimly. “Nothing has been touched or taken. But there are footprints that might – or might not – prove the intrusion.”

At that Sherlock finally looked up from his microscope, turning halfway towards Mike, showing at least a modicum of interest.

“Your… what did you call him? Resident patient?” Mike nodded.

“He insists that somebody has been in his room?” Mike nodded again,

“And yet he wouldn’t call the police?” Mike nodded a third time.

“Now, _that_ ,” Sherlock said languidly, “is interesting.”

“You think so?” Mike clearly wasn’t so sure about that. “Lots of people hesitate to call the police, especially if they can’t prove that something has actually happened.”

“But the possibility scared him, didn’t it?” Sherlock pointed out. “Scared him enough to agree to you getting help _outside_ the police.”

Mike nodded. “I never saw a grown man work himself up so much over such a small thing. Something that might only exist in his imagination anyway. Why, he was all but crying, and I could barely get him to speak coherently. This has gone on for days by now, showing no sign to sort itself. I’ve come to the end of my patience with him.”

“And so, since the police wouldn’t take him seriously, even if he _were_ willing to call them, you thought that I might be interested,” Sherlock said, his face impassive.

“Well… yeah,” Mike admitted uncomfortably.

“And you were right,” Sherlock rose. “This might be a small puzzle, but one of potential interest, once I’ve got all the details. Let’s go.”

“But what about your experiment?” Mike made a vague gesture towards the lab table. Sherlock shrugged.

“I’m researching he growth rate of mould on various substances. It will make its own progress in my absence. Come, let’s get a cab.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
As usual, Sherlock managed to get a cab at once, and within twenty minutes they were dropped off in front of Mike’s residence in Brook Street. It was one of those sombre, flat-faced Victorian houses that had once been so characteristic for a West End practice. Sherlock briefly wondered how Mike could afford it, but soon discharged the thought as irrelevant – for the moment anyway.

Mike opened the front door with his own key – no personnel within the house, Sherlock noted absent-mindedly – mentioning that his receptionist only came on consultation days, and they began to climb the broad, well-carpeted stairs when the lights suddenly went off upstairs.

“Stay where you are!” a high, almost hysterical voice ordered from the darkness. “I’ve got a gun and I’m gonna use it if you come any closer!”

Mike rolled his eyes. “Oh, for God’s sake, Mr. Blessington,” he said in exasperation, “this is really getting old. Calm down, would you? I’ve brought someone who might help figuring out if there truly was an intruder in your room.”

For some time, the unseen man didn’t answer; then there was a resigned sigh in the darkness.

“All right,” the voice from before said wearily. “I’m sorry I overreacted. Please come up.”

The lights switched on again, and now Sherlock could see the man standing at the top; a man who was clearly a nervous wreck. A man of considerable girth, who, apparently, had at some time been much fatter, if the folds of skin hanging about his face in loose pouches were any indication. He was pale, almost pastry in colour and had thin, sandy hair that seemed to bristle up with the intensity of his agitation that was slowly ebbing as he watched them.

Finally deciding that he would trust the doctor and his unknown companion, he put the gun – an alarmingly large one – in his waistband and stepped aside, so that Sherlock and Mike could climb the stairs.

“You do realise, of course, that keeping a gun on you is illegal, unless you have permission from the police to do so,” Sherlock commented.

The man nodded. “Sure; but I need to make precautions. You’re the private detective Dr. Stamford mentioned?”

“ _Consulting_ detective,” Sherlock corrected coldly. Why couldn’t people get their facts straight? Was it _really_ so hard? “The only one there is. The name is Sherlock Holmes; I suppose you’ve heard about me.”

The man seemed to shrink at his tone and apologised profusely. “Yes, yes, of course, I’m sorry. I suppose Dr. Stamford has also told you about the intrusion into my room?”

“Quite so,” Sherlock said. “So, who were the people who, in your opinion, came into your room and what could they possibly want from you?”

“Well, well,” Blessington hesitated, looking everywhere save directly in his eyes. “Of course, it’s hard to tell. You can hardly expect me to answer _that_ , Mr. Holmes, now can you?”

Sherlock raised a sceptical eyebrow. “You mean you don’t know?” he asked doubtfully, noticing how much the man was sweating – always a sign of someone lying.

“Come... come in here and I’ll show you,” Blessington herded them into his large and comfortably furnished bedroom. There he took a painting off the wall and pointed at the small safe behind it. “You see, sir, I’ve never been a wealthy man. Never made but one investment in my life, as Dr. Stamford can tell you. But I don’t believe in bankers. I’d never trust a banker.”

“Knowing a few of them, I can’t really blame you,” Sherlock said dryly, thinking of his old university mate, Sebastian Wilkes, now director of the Trading Floor at _Shad Sanderson Bank_. “But what has _that_ to do with your case?”

“Well, sir,” Mike’s patient explained, shifty-eyed, “what little I own is in that safe, so you can understand that I’m not exactly happy about unknown people searching my room.”

“ _Probably_ searching,” Mike corrected _sotto voce_ , still not buying the whole story.

Sherlock, however, simply glared at the man with the frightening intensity of sun-bathing reptiles fixing their next prey.

“I can’t help you if you keep lying to me,” he said. Blessington gave him a look of wounded innocence that didn’t even fool Mike, who was generally a gullible man.

“But I’ve told you _everything_!” Blessington exclaimed.

“No, you haven’t,” Sherlock replied with absolute certainty; then he whirled around to glare at Mike for a change. “I’d thank you if you didn’t bring me out on such a fool’s errand, doctor,” he said in a scathing tome. “My time is valuable, as you know, and I don’t like wasting it on people who try to deceive me. It’s an interesting case, at the bottom of it, but until your patient starts cooperating, I’m out.”

With that, he ran down the stairs with the elegance of a festival dancer, Mike trudging after him, trying desperately to catch up.

“Wait!” Blessington cried after them in anguish. “Don’t you have at least some advice for me?”

“Try the truth!” Sherlock called, without as much as a glance back.

~TBC~


	5. The Russian Visitors

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**THE RUSSIAN VISITORS**

He stormed out of the house, his coattails flapping after him like the wings of an enraged crow, his long legs carrying him with twice as much speed as Mike’s chubby ones could have produced. He’d crossed Oxford Street and was halfway down Harley Street already when Mike finally caught up with him.

“Sherlock, wait!” he painted. “I don’t understand any of this!”

Sherlock rolled his eyes, waved for a passing cab and started to analyse the situation while he was climbing into the back seat, talking a mile a minute as was his wont.

“Well, it’s clear that there’s at least _someone_ who’s hell-bent to get at your patient – for reasons I’m sure we’ll find out eventually.”

“How?” Mike asked, heaving into the cab next to him. “You’ve just given up the case, haven’t you?”

“Yes, but I’m still curious,” Sherlock gave the cabbie the address of _Bart’s_ before continuing. “For starters, I need you to tell me how many people visited your consulting hours on the day Blessington discovered the intrusion and who they were.”

“That was a slow day,” Mike said. “As I have lessons on Thursday afternoons, I usually don’t take any cases on that evening. This one, however, had booked a consulting hour via the website, so I decided to take the case without calling my receptionist in. The patient arrived at 18:15, as arranged, escorted by his son. He introduced himself as a Russian businessman, currently living in London.”

“Hmmm,” Sherlock’s brain kicked visibly in higher gear. “Can you describe them? What did they look like? Did they have any distinctive characteristics?”

“Well, the father was an elderly man, thin and reserved,” Mike began. “He didn’t look how I’d imagine a Russian businessman at all. But there was something in his eyes that gave me the impression that he was used to give orders and be obeyed.”

“What was his excuse to visit you?” Sherlock pressed on. Mike shrugged.

“He apparently suffered from cataleptic attacks, heard of me – no need to look like _that_ , I’m actually a specialist in that area! – and hoped that I could help him.”

“Was he a genuine patient?” Sherlock’s tone revealed that he seriously doubted it.

Mike made an uncertain gesture. “To be honest, he didn’t strike me as particularly intelligent, and his answers, when I asked him about his condition, were somewhat nebulous. But again, he didn’t speak English very well.”

“Oh, don’t be stupid, of course he did!” Sherlock said impatiently. “He just wanted to deceive you – and succeeded, it seems.”

Mike ignored the causal insult with practiced ease.

“If you think so. In any case, as I sat there, taking notes, he abruptly fell silent. I turned to him to ask what was wrong and found him sitting bolt upright in his chair, staring at me with a blank, rigid face,” he shuddered. “Even after all the cases I’ve already seen, it’s not a pretty sight.”

“Were the symptoms what you’d expect, based on previous experience?” Sherlock asked. Mike nodded.

“Oh, yes. I made notes of my patient’s pulse and temperature, tested the rigidity of his muscles and examined his reflexes. There was nothing markedly abnormal in any of their condition.”

“It _was_ a genuine attack, then?” Sherlock pressed.

“At the very least the symptoms appeared genuine,” Mike assured him. “However, I happened to get a phone call on the landline in the reception area, and when I got back, my patient was gone.”

“Ah!” Sherlock leaned back with a smug grin. “He _was_ a fake, after all; and so was his illness.”

Mike shook his head. “Not necessarily. Cataleptic attacks can end as abruptly as they’ve begun; and the patient’s mind is often confused afterwards. It’s quite possible that the old man woke up in what would seem a strange room to him and made his way out into the street in a slightly dazed state while I was taking that call. His son, waiting for him, might believe that the consultation was over and simply followed him.”

“Ah, yes, the son,” Sherlock said. “You’ve mentioned him Can you describe him to me in more detail?”

“Sure,” Mike shrugged. “He was a tall, ruggedly handsome bloke with dark hair, dark eyes and more muscles than any decent man is entitled to have. Actually, he could have passed as a third Klitschko brother, both in size and features.”

“Did he strike you as a Russian?” Sherlock asked.

“To be honest, I couldn’t tell a Russian from a Czech or any other East-European for my life,” Mike admitted. “The young man _did_ have an accent like in those bad espionage films, but whether it was genuine or not… He spoke English much better than his father, albeit with a slight lisp, but that’s all I can tell. I can look up their names in my database, though, if you want me to.”

“Irrelevant,” Sherlock waved impatiently. “They’re most certainly false. It was doubtlessly the younger one who searched Mr. Blessington’s room, while his partner-in-crime kept you from interfering by his well-rehearsed performance.”

“That’s impossible!” Mike protested. “That was a cataleptic attack if I ever saw one, and trust me, I _have_ seen a lot of those.”

“A skilled imitation,” Sherlock corrected. “He knew you were a specialist and gave you exactly what you expected from him. The symptoms are very easy to imitate, really. I’ve done it myself.”

“ _When_?” Mike’s eyes were big like saucers. “ _Why_?”

Sherlock waved off his question. “Irrelevant. They must have studied Blessington’s habits and checked your consulting hours well in advance, in order to ensure that neither your receptionist nor other patients would be in the waiting room; and that Blessington would be out, on his habitual walk before dinner.”

“But there’s no sign that the rooms would indeed have been searched,” Mike reminded him, climbing out of the cab as it stopped in front of _Bart’s_.

“Which proves that they weren’t merely after plunder,” Sherlock followed him, paying the cabbie. “No; they were looking for something special, and Blessington knows what that is and who _they_ are.”

“How can you be so sure about that?” Mike asked.

Sherlock shrugged. “I can read in a man’s eye when he’s afraid for his own hide. It’s only logical that somebody who’s made such determined enemies as these two fake Russians would know about it.”

“You really think Blessington knows who these men are?” Mike was still a little doubtful.

“Oh, yes, he knows it,” Sherlock replied. “He just won’t admit it, and the reason for that can only be that he, too, has a few skeletons in his cupboard. Let’s hope he’ll be in a more communicative mood tomorrow.”

“Unlikely, as far as I’ve come to known him in the last two years,” Mike sighed. “Can we be absolutely true that somebody was in his room in the first place? Couldn’t he have imagined things?”

“He could,” Sherlock allowed. “But in this case, he didn’t.”

Mike shook his head in bewilderment. “How can you tell? You didn’t even examine his room in any detail!”

“I didn’t have to,” Sherlock said with a shrug. “The young man had left footprints on the stair-carpet, still visible after several days, which made it unnecessary for me to ask to see those which he might have made in the room. As you remember, it rained quite heavily in the previous few evenings, and you said yourself that the fake Russians were the only patients on that day. So the young man was the only person who could have left those footprints.”

“How so?” Mike frowned. “Could it not have been Blessington himself? He was out in the afternoon, too. Or it could have been my footprints, too.”

Sherlock shook his head. “No; the prints were made by a square-toed shoe, not a pointed one like Blessington’s.”

“My shoes are square-toed, too,” Mike pointed out.

“Yes, but the footprints on the stair-carpet were an inch and a third longer than yours,” Sherlock replied. “In any case, my work there is done. We’ll continue when Mr. Blessington decides to stop lying and start cooperating.”

“You think he will, ever?” Mike asked.

“Oh, yes,” Sherlock said with a dark little smile. “He’s the sort of petty criminal that _loves_ to pour out his heart. I’m sure we’ll hear of him before long.”

~TBC~


	6. Puppeteers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just some background action to bind up the loose threads.

**PUPPETEERS**

Mycroft Holmes was sitting in his limousine – which was, in turn, currently parking in front of the classical marble-columned entrance of the _Diogenes Club_ , waiting for him to enter his refuge – listening to Ianto’s report. He could have done so in the _Strangers’ Room_ , of course, but Ianto needed to keep a low profile as long as he was officially dead.

Hence the car; but the location didn’t change the fact that he was content with what he’d heard.

“Mrs. Hudson is willing to accept him as a boarder, then?” he asked, somewhat unnecessarily, just to summarise the facts for himself. Ianto nodded.

“She seemed quite happy to do so, sir. I assume it was you who ensured that her insane husband would be executed for his hideous crimes, instead of being pardoned and put into a psychiatric hospital?”

“No; that was genuinely Sherlock,” Mycroft smiled vaguely. “Or rather the Doctor, in his eight incarnation; he used to visit Florida at the right time. I just changed the alias he’d used during his stay in the States to Sherlock’s name, that’s all.”

“ _He_ did it?” Ianto was surprised. “I thought the Doctor despised violence; and that he opposed lethal penalty. Jack always sang in the highest tones about his peaceful ways.”

“Harkness is – _was_ – completely biased when it came to Doctor, as you know,” Mycroft replied. “Besides, he only knew him during his ninth and tenth incarnations. Each regeneration is different. We not only change our looks, we often develop very different personalities, too. It can be a tad… confusing sometimes.”

“Well, the one I knew from hearsay was certainly a bastard,” Ianto said darkly.

Mycroft sighed. “Ten did have his moments; fortunately, the following versions showed much improvement. In any case, as we are the last ones of our race still alive – at least on Earth – I’m responsible for him; and I take my responsibilities seriously.”

“Are you sure there aren’t any others, sir?” Ianto asked. “The Master has fooled both of you before.”

“And he _can_ do so again, which is something of a concern,” Mycroft admitted. “There’s no way to recognise a Time Lord in human disguise – not even for another Time Lord. Which is why you must keep that watch safe, by any means necessary. Do you have it on you?”

“All the time,” Ianto fished the fob watch out of the pocket of his waistcoat and weighed it in his palm thoughtfully. “It’s an odd feeling, really. Holding in my hand everything that makes him the Doctor. As if I had him at my mercy.”

“That is an illusion,” Mycroft warned. “You can’t harm him through the watch, you know. Should you destroy it, you would only release his true nature.”

Ianto nodded. “I know. And it’s not so as if I’d really want to harm him. Punch him in the nose, yeah, definitely, but harm him? No; I was just thinking how Jack would sell his soul for the chance of becoming his keeper… and I, who never wanted to have _anything_ to do with him, have been assigned this task. Why me, sir? You could do that. Or Anthea.”

“We could,” Mycroft agreed,” but that would be wrong. Of us all, including Harkness, you’re the only human truly from Earth. The only one who really belongs to this time period. It’s your right to decide when he can be unleashed over this clueless planet again.”

“What if I decide that Earth has had enough of him?” Ianto asked. “If I choose to encase the sodding watch in concrete and bury it on the bottom of the ocean?”

“Then he’ll live out the natural life of a human; and when that human dies, he’ll be gone forever, as he won’t have a body in which he return,” Mycroft gave Ianto a sharp look as if wondering whether he’d misread the young man. “Is that _what_ you want?”

Ianto shook his head and pocketed the watch again. “Nah; Jack would never forgive me.”

“And you’d spare him just because his demise would upset Harkness?” Mycroft arched an inquisitive eyebrow. Ianto shrugged and Mycroft’s glance sharpened again. “You still make your decisions dependent on how Harkness would react. That can be dangerous.”

“I care for him,” Ianto said calmly.

Mycroft shook his head with a sad expression. “Caring is not an advantage, Ianto. It makes you vulnerable.”

“No,” Ianto replied. “It makes me _human_ , sir. And it makes _you_ human, too.”

“That, again, is something I wouldn’t consider as an advantage,” Mycroft said dryly. “No offence intended.”

“None taken, sir,” Ianto shrugged. “Your opinion about us is positively flattering, compared with that of the Doctor. So I can’t deny seeing a bit of poetic justice in the fact that he’s got to live as one of us again – and be completely clueless about it.”

“Speaking of which, I assume you’ve taken care of the transferring of his funds?” Mycroft asked. “Including the necessary restrictions, so that he wouldn’t be able to access most of the capital?”

Ianto nodded. “Of course, sir. May I ask why you chose the _Shad Sanderson Bank_ , though? I thought you’d prefer the older, time-honoured ones.”

“I do,” Mycroft agreed, “but _Sherlock_ wouldn’t. Choosing a modern bank in Tower 42, with all that glass and chrome and revolving doors and high-end technology is a very Sherlock thing to do… just like the website, the smartphone and all the other little gadgets. Besides, Sebastian Wilkes, the Director of the Trading Floor at _Shad Sanderson_ , is a schoolfriend of Sherlock. A genuine one.”

“Isn’t that a bit risky, sir?” Ianto asked with a frown. “What if he notices the difference?”

Mycroft shook his head. “Unlikely. They haven’t met since university and people, especially young people, change a lot in ten years. We’ve managed to find a fellow student with a matching personality and simply altered the name and the personal data, adding a few fake memories about them being causal friends. Well, _acquaintances_. Sherlock doesn’t _have_ any friends.”

“Sherlock… or the Doctor?” Ianto asked.

“Neither,” Mycroft replied simply. “We Time Lords are too arrogant to make friends, even among our own kind.”

“I’ll take your word for that, sir,” Ianto said diplomatically. “I also presume there’s no chance for the actual schoolfriend to show up unexpectedly?”

“No; he died from a cocaine overdose a few years ago.” Mycroft explained. “About the same time Sherlock was supposedly in drug therapy.”

“How… convenient,” Ianto commented dryly, but Mycroft shook his head.

“Not our doing. But the fact gave us the idea to build up Sherlock as a cocaine addict in the first place. It explained why no-one would get to see him in person. It has been a ready-made alias for years; well before the TARDIS would crash-land in our back yard. By the way, where _is_ she now?”

“Already delivered to 221 Baker Street as an XXL-sized fridge,” Ianto replied. “Anthea fixed the chameleon circuit and locked it, so that she’d remain a fridge until… well, until the Doctor would need her again. The perception filter also works like a charm, so nobody would even _think_ that she could be anything else than a fridge.”

“Good,” Mycroft suppressed a smile. The TARDIS as a fridge was an amusing image, but it had been her choice to begin with. “Did Mrs. Hudson have any objections against having such a big fridge in the flat?”

Ianto smiled. “I told her it was a loan, so that Sherlock wouldn’t raid _hers_ ; or put any disgusting experiments into it. She was actually grateful. She’s excited about having him as a boarder, in truth. I think it will work out just fine.”

“Let’s hope so,” Mycroft sighed and got out of the limousine. “Have Anthea install that surveillance system anyway. This is a potentially volatile situation and we should be better safe than sorry.”

~TBC~


	7. Quartet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**PART 18 – QUARTET**

Detective Inspector Lestrade was about to finish for the night and leave for home when the call came in. He could see Donovan take it; he saw her face fell and reached for his phone resignedly to text his wife. He knew there would be no going home tonight.

“We’ve got another one?” he asked in defeat; not that there could have been any doubt.

Donovan nodded. “We’ve got another one,” she agreed grimly.

Lestrade closed his eyes. “Where?”

Donovan studied her notebook. “At 403 Brook Street,” she frowned. “A rather posh neighbourhood for a change.”

“Brook Street?” Lestrade repeated with a frown. “Isn’t that where Dr. Stamford has his private practice?”

Donovan gave him a blank look. “Doctor _who_?”

“Mike Stamford,” Anderson told her, collecting his gear needed for the examination of the crime scene. “The fat bloke with the glasses who sometimes works with Miss Hooper at _Bart’s_. Also known as the lapdog of the Freak.”

“Oh, _him_!” Donovan waved dismissively, but Lestrade had had enough.

“All right, that’s it, both of you,” he said. “Stop it or I’ll stop it for you. Dr. Stamford is a respected teacher at the medical school as well as a name-worthy scientist, and I won’t have you two let out your dislike for Holmes on him, just because they’re friends.”

“Friends!” Donovan snorted. “The Freak doesn’t _have_ friends. He’s just using Stamford; like he’s using Hooper at _Bart’s_.”

“Which is none of your business, as long as they’re okay with it,” Lestrade interrupted. “They do their jobs, you do yours and Sherlock does his – and together, we solve our cases better than any other department at New Scotland Yard. Now, shut up and let’s go take a look at the fourth member in our suicidal quartet.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
When they reached 403 Brook Street, they found Sherlock Holmes already at the crime scene and Dr. Stamford in a state of complete nervous breakdown. The paramedics were also there, wrapping him in a ridiculously orange shock blanket and giving him something to calm him down.

“Another mysterious suicide,” Holmes greeted them cheerfully. “Mr Blessington hanged himself in a closed room – isn’t it exciting?”

“Try not to enjoy it too much,” Lestrade muttered angrily.

The only answer he got was an indifferent shrug from their resident menace.

“What’s the Freak doing here anyway?” Anderson demanded.

Sherlock looked him up and down arrogantly. “Really, Anderson, what use do you have for that miserable little brain of yours anyway? Aside from figuring out sorry excuses for your wife whenever you sneak away into the broom closet with Sally here, that is.”

Anderson’s face became beet red with anger. For a moment, it seemed as if he’d hit Sherlock, but Lestrade intervened just in time.

“Actually, I’d like to know that myself, Sherlock.”

Holmes rolled his eyes with his customary why-are-all-people-such-idiots expression.

“Isn’t that obvious? Mike called me.”

“And why would he call _you_ instead of the police?” Lestrade asked. Sherlock sighed.

“Because I’ve met the victim just a few days ago at his request, that’s why. Besides, he did call the police, obviously, or you still wouldn’t have a clue.”

Lestrade’s eyes widened in surprise. “Have you now? Well, if this isn’t our lucky day! What can you tell us about the victim? Who was he anyway? Was he Dr. Stamford’s flatmate?”

“Not quite,” Sherlock replied. “He was Mike’s resident patient. Has been for the last two years, actually.”

“Oh, for God’s sake!” Anderson rolled his eyes. “Is there still such thing as resident patients? I thought they became extinct in the early twentieth century.”

“Try not to think so much, Anderson,” Sherlock returned. “It might put too much strain on your brain.”

“Stop it, both of you!” Lestrade ordered. “Clearly, we need to learn more about Dr. Stamford’s relationship with his… _patient_. Also, we need to find out if he – or the victim – could, in any way, be connected to the other suicides.”

“I’m sure Mike will be more than happy to tell you everything,” Sherlock said. “This is the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to him in his whole life. I, on the other hand, need to see the crime scene.”

“No way!” Anderson protested. “I don’t want my crime scene contaminated.”

“Then stay out of it!” Sherlock snapped.

Lestrade ignored them both. Unfortunately, he couldn’t ignore the increasing pressure behind his ears that promised the mother of all headaches coming within the hour.

“I can give you five minutes,” he told Sherlock. “Anderson, find something else to do in the meantime. Let’s go.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
They climbed the stairs and entered Blessington’s bedroom. The sight that greeted them wasn’t appealing. If Blessington had appeared flabby the last time Sherlock saw him, now he was bloated to almost grotesque proportions, dangling from the hook in his long nightshirt.

“What a bizarre sight,” Sherlock commented, looking up at the dead man with his head tilted to the side, bird-like. “Don’t you find that he looks like a plucked chicken, with his neck drawn out like that?”

“No more bizarre than your obvious enjoyment of the whole thing,” Lestrade muttered, eyeing the swollen ankles and ungainly feet hanging out from beneath the nightshirt unenthusiastically. “Take a look around and tell me what can you make of what you see. Your five minutes are ticking.”

Sherlock launched into action without bothering to answer. Knowing how little time he had, he tried to get the overall picture as well as picking up as many details as possible, talking to himself – and to Lestrade – as he was doing so.

“Hmmm… last time I saw him, the man was already scared out of his mind. Nonetheless, the bed has been slept in; as you can see, the impression is still deep enough, which means he must have been lying there at least four or five hours. It’s about 5 a.m. – a popular time for suicides, a logical choice if they wanted to make us believe that he’d hung himself.”

“You mean he hasn’t?” Lestrade asked. Sherlock rolled his eyes.

“Of course not, and neither have the other three, try to pay attention to the bigger picture, would you? This is a meticulously planned, well-executed murder, just like the other cases.”

“Okay,” Lestrade said. “Let’s say you’re right…”

“Of course I am!” Sherlock scoffed.

“… but you’ll have to provide me with some hard proof and at least one suspect before I can go out and start arresting people,” Lestrade continued, ignoring the interruption.

Sherlock mulled over _that_ for a moment; then he nodded abruptly.

“Very well; but I’ll need more than five minutes to give you what you need. Go and talk to Mike about his patient while I examine this room in more detail. And keep Anderson out of my hair, for God’s sake!”

After a moment of hesitation Lestrade reluctantly agreed and went to interview Mike Stamford. Finally left alone, Sherlock went to the door first and examined the lock thoroughly, even taking out a magnifying lens. He hummed contentedly when he found the small, barely visible scratches both on the key and around the keyhole. He took photos of them with his smartphone for further evidence.

Then he examined the bed, the carpet – which had some faint footprints on it, two pairs of them he also took photos of – the chairs, the mantelpiece, the dead body and the rope on which it hung. More photos were taken, as well as tiny samples from the rope. He found three cigarette stubs in the fireplace and carefully put them into an evidence bag to examine them later at _Bart’s_ himself.

“Yes,” he murmured. “Yes, the actual facts are horribly dull, and I’d be surprised if I didn’t have the reason for them within a day or two. That photo from the mantelpiece and the victim’s fingertips should prove very useful.”

~TBC~


	8. A Deal With the Devil

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL**

“I studied at London University, thanks to a scholarship founded by the Holmes family,” Mike Stamford explained to Lestrade, after the sedative had taken effect and he felt up to returning to his consulting room and talking to the police.

He was vaguely ashamed by the fact that he’d needed a benefactor to be able to study in the first place, but what other chance did he have? His mother had refused to support him, due to their differences concerning her choices, and he had no money to his name whatsoever.

“I was… I was a promising student,” he continued, “which is how I got a minor position at _Bart’s_ after graduating. A position where I have the chance to do some research aside from teaching a few classes, too.”

“All this, no doubts, thanks to the generosity of the Holmeses,” Anderson commented cynically. Mike shot him an unfriendly look.

“I never denied that I owe Mr. Holmes a lot,” he returned angrily. “But my research into the pathology of catalepsy is my own; and I didn’t win the Bruce Pinkerton prize with his help, either. It was all _my_ doing, _my_ sleepless nights spent in the labs, bent over the microscope. My dissertation on nervous lesions was written by me alone, and so were the articles that I’ve published in various medical journals since then, thank you very much.”

“Don’t insult the witness, Anderson; you might need his knowledge one day,” Lestrade said calmly. “Please do go on, Dr. Stamford. How have you, a teacher and researcher, ended up with a resident patient? Isn’t that unusual for a theoretical scientist?”

Stamford’s rosy face crumpled in misery. It was a strange thing, seeing such a competent, self-confident man flatten like a prickled balloon, Lestrade found.

“I’ve made a deal with the devil, you could say,” the doctor confessed glumly. “You see, my main problem had always been the lack of capital. I _needed_ to practice, in order to continue research; I needed _patients_. And I needed at the very least a consulting room and a part-time receptionist. _And_ I needed supplies; and a car to go to my patients if they couldn’t come to me – all things I simply couldn’t afford on my own. I was still living in the same bed-sit as in my student years, for God’s sake!”

“And that’s where the late Mr. Blessington came into the picture,” Lestrade guessed.

Stamford nodded. “Yes,” he said simply.

“Had you known him from earlier?” the Detective Inspector asked.

Stamford shook his head. “No; he simply marched into my office at _Bart’s_ two year ago, out of the blue. He seemed to know who I was; that I’d recently won a prize and asked if I’d like to start a practice in Brook Street, of all places.”

“Just like that?” Anderson asked doubtfully. Stamford shrugged.

“Just like that, yeah. Said he had some money to invest; and that investing it in me seemed safer to him than any other speculation. I was flattered, actually.”

“I can see why,” Lestrade nodded. “What, exactly, were the terms of your agreement?”

“Blessington offered to find a house, pay the rent _and_ the wages of my receptionist – if I handed over three quarters of what I’d earn on any potential patients, and he could stay with me as a resident patient. He said his heart was weak and he needed constant medical supervision.”

“And you accepted the offer?” Lestrade could barely believe how naïve the doctor had been.

Stamford shrugged again. “What other chance did I have? Without a sponsor it would have taken me _decades_ to put up my plate – if ever.”

“And so the two of you lived together for the last two years,” Lestrade said; it wasn’t a question. “How did it work out?”

“We managed,” Stamford replied with another indifferent shrug. “Blessington required the two best rooms upstairs for himself, of course, turning them into a bedroom and a living room, and I didn’t see much of him, save in the evenings of my consulting days, when he’d come down into my practice, checked my books and took three quarters of whatever I had earned on that day.”

“It must been humiliating like hell,” Donovan said with just a touch of compassion. She, too, came from a less than wealthy family and had to work hard for every penny all her life.

“It wasn’t always pleasant,” Stamford admitted, “but he _had_ supplied me with the means of starting my practice in the first place, and I _did_ agree to the conditions.”

“ _He_ was the one who came out of this partnership a wealthy man, though, wasn’t he?” Donovan asked. “With a few good cases and the reputation you’ve won at Bart’s you must have made him fairly rich.”

“Not exactly rich, no,” Stamford corrected, “but considerably wealthy, yes.”

“Would it be correct to say that by now you’d be able to run the place on your own?” Lestrade asked. “ _If_ he hadn’t kept taking three quarters of your income?”

Stamford calculated a little in his head, and then nodded.

“In all probability… yes. You see, he didn’t have access to my wages at _Bart’s_ , modest as they may be, so I was able to set aside some money in the two years he was paying the rent – _and_ my receptionist. I may not be able to keep the receptionist – unless I marry her, and I really don’t think she’d be interested – but I could, most likely, keep the practice…” his speech slowed down, realising where the question might be taking him, and became defensive at once. “Hey, wait a minute! You’re not thinking I had something to do with his death, do you? Cause if you do, you’re mistaken!”

“Right now we still treat the case as a suicide, regardless what Sherlock might think,” Lestrade said soothingly. “Now, let’s get back to the victim. The more we learn about him, the closer we get to solving this case. Tell me, doctor; have Mr. Blessington’s habits or general behaviour changed lately?”

Stamford furrowed his brow, trying to remember – then it visibly dawned on him.

“As a matter of fact… yes, they have,” he said slowly.

“Excellent,” Lestrade said. “Now we’re making progress. Please, think about it _very_ carefully – and tell me _everything_. Every detail, no matter how insignificant it may appear to you. In the bigger context, it could turn out to be of great importance. Donovan, take notes.”

Donovan fished out her small notebook and a ball pen and looked at the doctor expectantly.

“You can speak as you always do,” she said. “I’m pretty good at shorthand; no need to wait for me.”

Mike Stamford thought longingly of his bed and a stiff drink or three – nothing else could have soothed his nerves in this miserable night – but realised that he wouldn’t get any of those before the police were done. So he leaned back in his armchair, sighed wearily and began to speak.

~TBC~


	9. The Mysterious Mr. Kuryakin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**THE MYSTERIOUS MR. KURYAKIN**

“Some weeks ago Mr. Blessington came down to me, highly agitated, telling about a series of break-ins in the West End,” he began. “He was almost hysterical about that for some reason and demanded that we should put additional security locks on the doors and windows. He even considered having an alarm system installed.”

“And?” Lestrade asked. “Did you?”

“Well, I found the idea ridiculous and the whole thing unnecessary – after all, here isn’t much to take, and he had a safe in his bedroom already – but since he was paying the bills, I thought I’d accommodate him,” Stamford replied. “There’s no use to argue with paranoid people, and a bit more safety is never wrong.”

“You didn’t mention him being paranoid before,” Lestrade said.

“Yeah, well, he _wasn’t_ paranoid before,” Stamford returned.

“He was, though, from this day on?” the Detective Inspector asked.

The doctor nodded. “Oh yeah, very much so. He was peering out of the windows all the time; even stopped taking short walks before dinner, although he’d done so regularly earlier. In fact, he didn’t even leave the house for almost a fortnight. You’d have thought his life was in mortal danger or whatnot.”

“Apparently, it _was_ ,” Anderson pointed out smugly. “Perhaps you should have listened to him.”

Stamford scowled at him in annoyance. “I’d like _you_ to make a difference between well-founded fear for one’s safety and full-blown paranoia. I’m not a shrink, dammit!”

Lestrade intervened with practiced ease before the two could get into a verbal fight. Between Sherlock and Anderson he sometimes felt like a frustrated pre-school teacher, and _this_ wasn’t any better.

“Did Blessington gradually calm down after those two weeks?” he asked, and Stamford nodded. “Did he also return to his normal habits? Like taking short walks?”

“For a while, yes,” Stamford replied. “Until that odd patient anyway. After that, everything got worse. _Much_ worse.”

“What odd patient?” Lestrade had a hard time to conceal his impatience. Getting details out of the doctor was like pulling teeth.

“The Russian one who left in the middle of a consultation right after having a cataleptic attack, less than a week ago,” Stamford explained readily enough. “Mr. Blessington was adamant that the son of the patient had searched his room while he was taking his daily walk. He worked himself up to such a state that I was worried about his heart and asked for Sherlock’s help to calm him down. I thought Sherlock would be able to tell whether there was an intrusion in the first place.”

“And?” Lestrade withstood the urge to kick the doctor in the shin in order to speed him up a bit. Barely. “Was there?”

“Apparently yes,” Stamford replied. “Sherlock found footprints on the stair carpet that, in his opinion, couldn’t be mine or Mr. Blessington’s. He also said that Blessington was lying to him and that both the Russian patient _and_ his son were fakes, and that he old man only imitated the attack to keep me occupied while his son searched the rest of the house.”

“Are you sure they were Russians at all?” Lestrade asked.

“No,” Stamford admitted. “But I didn’t really care. I’m a doctor; I focus on my patients’ diseases, not on their accent, false or otherwise. Yes, they _did_ have some sort of accent, but I haven’t got the faintest what sort it was. And they younger one, though he lisped a bit, spoke English very well. Satisfied?”

The detectives and Anderson exchanged meaningful looks.

“Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?” Donovan commented. “Tell me, Dr. Stamford, did this supposedly Russian patient give you any name? I assume you’ve started a medical file on him.”

“Why, of course!” Stamford replied, a little insulted that they’d take him for such a negligent person. “Only hand-written notes, though. I only set up files when the patient has agreed to further consultations or a certain treatment.”

He rummaged among the papers covering his desk until he found the right one.

“Here you are,” he said, handing it to Lestrade. “The name of the old man was Kuryakin. Pyotr Kuryakin. _What_?” he asked in bewilderment when both cops _and_ Anderson suddenly started howling with laughter.

“Why?” Lestrade asked rhetorically, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes, not caring that the laughter had worsened his headache considerably. “Why does nobody know the classics in these days?”

It took him and Donovan several minutes to explain the good doctor the significance of the name Kuryakin and why it couldn’t have been a genuine name. By then they had all calmed down, so that the investigation could be continued.

“We can be sure then that these two so-called Russians were as fake as probably the old man’s illness was,” Lestrade summarised. “I can also tell you, Dr. Stamford, that the young man – who most likely _wasn’t_ the older one’s son – has died shortly after their visit here.”

“Died?” Stamford exclaimed. “But he seemed so strong and healthy, a true Hercules, even if a little pale in face! What was the cause of his death?”

“He apparently hanged himself in his own flat,” Lestrade replied grimly. “Just like your resident patient; who, by the way, is the fourth such a case within the last month.”

“You suspect foul play,” Stamford said slowly, “ _and_ a connection.”

Lestrade nodded. “It would be a little too much of a coincidence otherwise, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Stamford agreed. “But how are you going to find that connection?”

“Well, we’ve sent the fingerprints of the previous victims to the central database,” Lestrade shrugged. “Miss Hooper is working on the autopsies, looking for similarities, and the DNA-analysis is running, too. It may take some time, but the results _will_ come in eventually… and I hope Sherlock’s found something useful at the crime scene.”

“Speaking of which,” Anderson rose from his seat, “it’s _my_ crime scene now. The five minutes of the Freak are ten times over by now.”

“He’s already left,” Donovan told him; at his surprised look she merely shrugged. “Isn’t that what he always does?”

“But how can you know that for sure?” Lestrade asked.

“Inspector, on the day I don’t know what he’s doing at a crime scene in every moment is the day you should fire me,” Donovan tapped on her phone with a finger. “The colleagues watching the scene kept tab on him for me and texted me the moment he left.”

Lestrade gave her a look that held a certain amount of admiration.

“Remind me never to get on your bad side, Sally,” he said, and she grinned at him in satisfaction.

~TBC~


	10. A Woman Called Harry

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this AU Harry Watson is "played" by Emilia Fox. Her ex, Clara, has been tentatively cast as Kathie McGrath, just because the two actresses worked well together in "Merlin".
> 
> Also, John Watson is married in many of the ACD stories. Since I wanted him unattached for most of this story, I gave him a (failed) pre-series marriage. And since we're in multi-cultural London, I gave him an Indian ex-wife. One inspired by the main character from "The Mistress of Spices".

**A Woman Called Harry**

Harriet Watson stared at the official letter from the Royal Army in shocked disbelief. Granted, it wasn't the letter – the one she'd feared in recent years, the one that would tell her as John's next of kin that her brother had been killed in Afghanistan – but it was bad enough.

No, John hadn't been killed, but he'd been wounded severely enough to get an honourable discharge and to be sent home, invalided and with a serious case of PTSD.

Home to England where he had nothing to live for. Home to London where he didn't even have a home anymore. Not since the divorce had gone through and Mary, that stupid bitch, had sold their house and returned to her sodding family and her sodding spices.

As if driving John into the clutches of the Army with her constant whining about too long hours spent in hospital wards hadn't been enough. No, she had to make him homeless as well.

And he'll be arriving in four days – to find _what_? A sister whom he'd left clean, happily married and with a good job… and who was now back to drinking, getting a divorce and probably soon unemployed as well. He'd be so disappointed with her! He used to be glad that at least _one_ of them had managed to get a grip on their life, even though they never got on well.

How could her perfect life have gotten shattered to a myriad pieces in just a few years?

Deep within she knew the answer of course, she was just loath to admit it. It was the sodding bottle that had ruined every single one of her relationships: that with her brother, that with Clara, and it was just about to cost her the job, too, by alienating colleagues and clients alike. Again.

Just as it had done with her mother. In the Watson family, the drinking habit seemed to hit the women, almost exclusively. The men had their fair share of addictions, too, but different ones.

Their father had spent all his spare time at the horse races, betting, winning and losing. Actually, mostly losing, which had only made him more obsessed with the idea of winning back his losses. After a while, his small private practice could no longer cover the expenses, and he chose the coward's way out and shot himself in the head.

Thy never saw their mother in a sober state afterwards, and the excessive drinking took her to an early grave only three years later. At least she got to see John graduate before she died. And Harry fell into the familiar pattern of Watson women all too soon, whenever the stress became too much.

John was different; perhaps the most disciplined in their entire family. He _was_ an adrenalin junkie, true; one who thrived on danger and split-second decisions and the stress only working at A &E could offer a doctor… well, save the war, of course. But he always knew his limits and rarely went beyond them, unless there was no other way. He never sought danger for danger's sake alone, but he never backed off in the face of danger, either.

He should never have married Mary. Mary had always been a dead weight on his back; pulling him down like a millstone bound to his ankles. Mary, in her quaint little spice bazaar in the East End, surrounded by a colourful herd of siblings, first-, second- and third grade cousins, uncles and aunts and grandparents from both her mother's and her father's side, who still spoke Tulu among themselves, could never understand a man like John.

Despite the English name she bore – courtesy of some distant British ancestor somewhere up the family tree, the same one from whom she inherited her striking blue eyes – Mary Morstan was still spiritually trapped by her Bunt roots. Descending from erstwhile Keralan gentry, the family led a very traditional and much internalised life. Harry never understood how John could have made a mistake of marrying a woman of such a background.

Oh, sure, Mary was stunningly beautiful, like some Hindu goddess on those ancient paintings. But she was a good ten years younger than John and she knew nothing about the world aside her family traditions and her spices. Her family had been outraged when she married a stranger, as they put it, and after a few years of half-hearted struggle to fit in to _John's_ world, she simply fled back to them.

By the time the family had handed in the divorce papers John was already on his way to Afghanistan. That was _his_ way to deal with stress, his addiction. Perhaps less obvious than Harry's drinking, but every bit as destructive.

And now he was coming back, with a bullet wound in his shoulder bad enough to make him unfit for the armed duty and needing a cane to walk, and boy, wasn't _that_ gonna be the worst case of withdrawal since Harry's last – failed! – therapy? How long was he going to last, collecting his miserable army pension, with no excitement, no danger and nothing useful to do?

Would he shoot himself in the head like their father had done?

Oh God, how was she supposed to help him? Harry wrung her hands in despair She needed a stiff drink the worst possible way; hadn't had one for two days in a row, the longest time she'd managed since Clara and she had split up three months ago, but right now she couldn't manage without one any longer.

How was she supposed to support a broken man, returning invalided from the war, when she couldn't even manage her own affairs? John would spot at first sight that she was drinking again; he could always tell when she was having a relapse. Perhaps it was a doctor thing, or perhaps he just knew her too well, and there would be a big fight again, and God, she was so tired of fighting, she just couldn't do this anymore…

She ran to the bathroom to splash cold water into her face, in the hope to regain her balance. She hadn't counted with the effect of seeing her own image in the mirror, though – and _that_ was a shock.

She looked terrible, simply terrible. She'd lost a lot of weight since Clara had left and looked thin as a boy, almost wraith-like. There were dark rings around her eyes, and the pale skin was stretched too tight over sharp cheekbones above her hollow cheeks. Her dishwater-blonde hair was brittle and lifeless like old straw and generously streaked with grey, and her eyes were bloodshot. She shuddered from the sight.

She'd let herself go spectacularly since Clara's departure. That wouldn't do. She was barely beyond forty; she couldn't run around like some negligent old hag. First order of the business was to go to the hairdresser's and got her hair dyed a homogenous blonde again. Then, perhaps, to a beauty salon to have something done about her face, too. Cosmetics could cover a great deal of damage.

John would see through her mask of false beauty, of course. He always did. But she owed her brother – and probably herself, too – at least that much that there would be a still attractive woman waiting for him at the airport instead of an unkempt, elderly addict.

Cause she _would_ be there to welcome him home. Somebody had to – and his ex-wife certainly wouldn't.

What was she just about to do? Right, call the hairdresser and make an appointment. God, but her brain was sluggish today! She couldn't _possibly_ go out and deal with things in this foggy state of mind.

She reached into the cosmetics cupboard for her hidden stack of bourbon.

"Just one, to help me focus," she muttered the old excuse.

The amber liquid sloshed over the rand of the glass as she poured the drink with trembling hands.

~TBC~


	11. Miss Grosvenor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes. But one of the bad guys is _really_ called Moffat in the books, I swear! It’s not my fault!

**MISS GROSVENOR**

Detective Inspector Lestrade got back to Scotland Yard in the early afternoon of the next day, after barely five hours of sleep and a visit to _St. Bart’s_ morgue. He had several autopsy reports in his hand and a particularly grim expression on his face.

The bags under his eyes and the still raging headache were only the added bonus.

“Have you found Dr. Stamford’s part-time receptionist?” he asked Donovan, who was already in, as usual. Perhaps she hadn’t even gone home from Brook Street in the early morning.

Did the woman ever sleep?

Donovan shook her head. “No luck with that so far. Her mobile phone’s turned off and, according to her landlady, she hadn’t been home in the last four days at all. Ever since…”

“… ever since the younger one of the two fake Russians had been found dead at 221C Baker Street,” Lestrade finished for her. “Coincidence?”

“Hardly,” Donovan said with a snort. “She’s got something to do with these suicides or I don’t deserve my promotion.”

“Oh, I think you certainly deserve it,” Lestrade waved with the autopsy reports. “I think the current state of the investigation would justify a search warrant for her flat, don’t you agree?”

“Already done, sir,” Donovan replied. “I got the warrant in the morning and dragged Anderson over to the place. He wasn’t happy, of course – especially as we already found the Freak there, charming the landlady out of her knickers – but I thought it couldn’t wait.”

“You were right,” Lestrade nodded. “So, what did you find?”

“That’s what makes it really interesting, sir,” Donovan said slowly. “We found _nothing_. Absolutely nothing. Not even fingerprints or a grain of dust. This was the cleanest place I’ve ever seen. Any cleaner and it would have been a sterile lab – and that after this Miss Grosvenor had lived there for two years!”

“Two years, huh?” Lestrade rubbed his burning eyes with the heel of his hand tiredly. “She moved in at the same time Dr. Stamford hired her as a part-time receptionist, then?”

“On the same day, actually, according to the contract the landlady kindly showed us,” Donovan replied. “Oh, and just to let you know, sir, I’ve checked her personal background and guess what? Miss Irene Grosvenor doesn’t exist. She never has.”

“I’m not surprised,” Lestrade said in weary amusement. “That’s the name of some posh secretary in one of the Agatha Christie novels… _A Pocketful of Rye_ , if I’m not mistaken. Whoever these people are, they’re clearly fond of the classics.”

“As long as we don’t run into Hercule Poirot,” Donovan muttered darkly. “One self-absorbed freak is more than enough; and we’ve got our own here.”

“Truer words were never spoken,” a cheerful voice exclaimed and Sherlock swept into Lestrade’s office with flourish. “Why would you need Hercule Poirot when you can have Sherlock Holmes?”

Donovan muttered something unintelligible in response, which Sherlock ignored.

“Well, Detective Inspector?” he asked. “What did Molly find? Those suicides weren’t suicides at all, am I right? They were all murders. Well-planned, cold-blooded murders.”

“At least the first three certainly were,” Lestrade admitted reluctantly. “Mr. Blessington’s autopsy’s still going on. But I have no doubt that the results would be the same.”

“Death by strangulation, yet caused by a wire rather than by the rope from which the bodies were hanging, right?” Sherlock asked.

Donovan and Lestrade stared at him open-mouthed.

“How…?” the Detective Inspector finally asked.

Sherlock shrugged. “The strangulation marks are markedly different caused by a wire or a rope, although the murderer did a remarkably good job of overimposing the wire marks with the rope marks. Also, killing somebody with an old-fashioned, hand-held garrotte, which, I assume, has been used in all these so-called suicide cases, has become extremely rare in the recent decades. A shame, really; it’s a highly efficient, quiet and elegant murder weapon, unlike the guns and blunt objects that have become so popular. The criminal class really has no imagination nowadays.”

“If you’re done drooling over the murder weapon, perhaps you could tell us what wild theories you’ve come up _this_ time,” Donovan scowled.

Sherlock grinned at her like a shark.

“When could I ever say _no_ to you, Sally?” he threw himself into an armchair in his usual theatrical manner and launched into a lengthy explanation, seemingly without the need to breathe between the long, run-in sentences.

“The sequence of the events was easily reconstructed,” he began. “I’m actually surprised that you haven’t managed to figure it out without me, but it seems I’ve expected too much from you again. Anyway, there were six people involved in these serial suicides – or should we say serial murders, since that’s what they were? Four of them are already dead; that leaves us with the two still alive. One of them is without doubt the elderly man who masqueraded as poor Mike Stamford’s cataleptic Russian patient. The other one could only be the person we still know nothing of.”

“The elusive Miss Grosvenor,” Lestrade said. It was only logical.

Sherlock nodded. “Right. Whose true name, I assume, could only be Elise Worthingdon.”

For a moment Lestrade couldn’t actually breathe.

“That would mean we’ve finally stumbled upon the puppeteers behind the Worthingdon Bank business,” he finally said.

Sherlock nodded.

“Then the first three victims had to be the gang members who’d got a fifteen-year sentence, each: Biddle, Hayward and Moffat,” Lestrade said.

Sherlock nodded again.

“Then Blessington must have actually been Sutton,” the Detective Inspector continued.

Sherlock nodded a third time.

“But who could the old man be, the one who played the Russian patient,” Lestrade asked.

“I’ve no idea; not yet,” Sherlock admitted. “He could be related the fifth gang member, Cartwright, which would explain why he’s still alive; Miss Worthingdon has no reason to murder a relative of her late lover and partner in crime. Or he could have been hired for just the one deception; which, in turn, would explain why Moffat, his false ‘son’, was watching him like a hawk.”

“We’ll know more when the fingerprints from Dr. Stamford’s practice have been fully processed,” Lestrade said. “I wouldn’t be surprised it the older ’Russian’ turned out to be a close relative of Cartwright. He was orphaned at the age of ten, if I remember correctly, and grew up with an uncle, who was an infamous safe-knacker,” he looked at Donovan. “Put Elise Worthingdon and Percy Ward on the Most Wanted list. We cannot allow them to leave the country.”

“Right away, sir,” Donovan was already heading off, but she turned back for a moment from the threshold. “Can I hope that you’ll explain me what this Worthingdon Bank business is about, sir? It seems to have happened before my time, and I’d like to know what – and _whom_ – are we dealing with here.”

~TBC~


	12. The Worthingdon Bank Business

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**THE WORTHINGDON BANK BUSINESS**

Two days later Elise Worthingdon and Percy Ward were arrested in Dover when they tried to board the ferry to France. It took the police another week to wrap things up, collect all the evidence and get a confession out of them – not that the latter would have been particularly difficult. They actually seemed _proud_ of their achievement.

When all the paperwork was dealt with and the case had been handed over to the court, Detective Inspector Lestrade invited the interested parties into his office to put together the bigger picture for them – _and_ with their help.

With _help_ meaning mostly Sherlock, of course.

“So, Sherlock,” he said when everyone had found a chair to sit. “Talk to us. Tell us what we’ve missed, although it was evidently right before our eyes.”

“Actually, sir,” Donovan interrupted before Sherlock could have opened his mouth (and earning an annoyed glare for it), “I’d like you to tell us about this Worthindon Bank business first. I looked up the case, of course, but an eyewitness report would be more conclusive. I understand that you were in the Force already.”

“As a bloody beginner, breaking up bar fights, yeah,” Lestrade replied. “All right, then, let me summarise things for those _not_ born before the Stone Age. Almost eleven years ago, the daughter of Sir William Worthingdon, Elise – then barely seventeen years old – was kidnapped… as we learned later, with her full consent. The kidnappers demanded seven hundred thousand pounds, and Sir William, a widower who doted on his only child, was more than willing to pay. However, something went wrong with the delivery of the ransom, and Mr. Tobin, the junior partner of the bank – who, according to Sir William’s plan, was to marry Elise as soon as she’d come of age – was murdered. The kidnappers got away with the money and Elise remained missing almost to the current day.”

“I understand that the police arrested all five men involved in the case,” Donovan said. Lestrade nodded.

“Yes, but the evidence against them was by no means conclusive. We could never have nailed them down, hadn’t this Blessington, or rather Sutton – who, by the way, was the worst of the gang – turned against his pals and betrayed them. On his evidence, Cartwright was given a lifelong sentence, as he was the one who’d killed Mr. Tobin, and the others got fifteen years each,” he paused and looked at Sherlock. “I’ll leave the rest to you.”

“Well,” Sherlock began with his usual enthusiasm for a complicated case, “Biddle, Hayward and Moffat got out of prison earlier this year, which was some years before their full sentence. Cartwright died four years ago in a fight within the prison, and there’s some evidence that the other three were involved somehow. It could never be proved, of course, the inmates wouldn’t tell the guards, but for everyone with eyes to see, it was pretty evident.”

“But why would they turn against their own pal?” Mike Stamford asked.

Sherlock gave him a pitying glance.

“Really, Mike, what’s going on in that funny little brain of yours? It must be so _boring_! They were pissed off at him because of the murder of Mr. Tobin. That was where things went wrong – and besides, there was the matter of the seven hundred thousand pounds that were never found.”

“Who had the money anyway?” Mike asked.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Why, Miss Worthingdon, of course, do try to use your imagination! It was her plan all along. She didn’t want to marry proper and boring Mr. Tobin; so she pretended to wanting to run away with Cartwright, who was an idiot and did exactly what she wanted of him: killed Mr. Tobin and got her the ransom money, with which she intended to begin a new life, under a different name, in a different country. France, I suppose, as she had gone to school there and knew it fairly well.”

“So, why kill the others from the gang then?” Donovan asked. “Did they got out too early, before she could have her plans finalised, and demanded their part of the booty?”

Sherlock gave her a surprised look. “Sally, you’re actually not half as stupid as the rest of the police! Yes, exactly that’s why. Of course, there was the small complication that Blessington, or rather Sutton, had managed to lay hand on a considerable part of the ransom money and Elise had no intention to let him keep it.”

“Wait!” Mike interrupted. “How can you know _that_?”

Sherlock looked at Donovan. “Tell him. You were the one who found it.”

“The money was in the safe at Brook Street, Dr. Stamford,” Donovan explained. “Almost two hundred thousand pounds; the numbers had been noted in the bank before paying the ransom. Sutton had that safe made and the house rented long before he’d have ‘invested’ in you.”

“You mean he had it all the time and yet he kept taking three quarters of everything I earned in the practice?” Stamford exclaimed, his usually so kind face red with anger.

Sherlock gave him a jaundiced look. “Well, he wasn’t a very nice man, Mike, in case you hadn’t noticed it. There was a reason why his pals hated him so much, beyond the fact that he betrayed them all. In any case, Miss Worthingdon kept tag on Sutton all the time, without getting close to him, cause she planned to get the money in the last moment before leaving the country.”

“Why did she apply for the receptionist job, then?” Mike asked. “That brought her directly within Sutton’s reach. Wasn’t she afraid that he’d recognize her?”

“Yes, but people, especially young people, do change a great deal in eleven years; and she did her best to look even more different,” Sherlock said. “She grew out her hair, bleached it blonde, walked around in high heels to appear much taller than she actually was, wore blue contact lenses… it was a perfect illusion. And she needed the rest of the money for…” he looked at Lestrade questioningly.

“To pay the last rate for the vineyard and the house she’d bought in the Provence years ago,” Lestrade supplied.

“So, she needed the money,” Sherlock continued. “But Sutton was too suspicious; in the two years she worked for you, she couldn’t get into his room. Not without giving her true identity away. And certainly not without help.”

“And the fact that her three henchmen got out of prison before their full term served her purposes nicely,” Lestrade added. “They were more than willing to hunt down the traitor. They thought she didn’t know about their part in Cartwright’s death.”

“But she didn’t really love Cartwright, did she?” Mike asked with a frown. “Why would she be so bent on revenge?”

“She wasn’t,” Sherlock said. “In fact, she was quite glad to have one less aspirant for the money. But she let the other three believe that she was still grieving for Cartwright, cause it kept them in fear what she might do with them, should she find out the truth.”

“So it was she who let the killers into the house,” Donovan said. “As Dr. Stamford’s receptionist, she knew the doctor’s schedule at _Bart’s_ and that he wouldn’t be home in that night.”

“But Blessington… I mean, Sutton… must have known that the other three have been released,” Mike said. “It stood in the newspapers. _That_ was what caused his initial panic attack.”

Sherlock nodded. “Of course. All that talk about the burglary in West End was merely an excuse to enhance security in the house.”

“Well, this all sounds convincing,” Mike said. “There’s one thing I still don’t understand, though. Who killed all these people, and how did they do it?”

“Oh, that!” Sherlock said nonchalantly. “That was Miss Worthingdon, of course.”

~TBC~


	13. The Final Deduction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are still dealing with events from the original ACD story here. And yes, there are still considerable changes.

**THE FINAL DEDUCTION**

Everyone present – save for Lestrade who’d already read all interrogation protocols – stared at Sherlock open-mouthedly.

“Miss Worthingdon?” Mike repeated incredulously. “That cute little thing who could barely manage to keep the patient database straight, should be a calculating, cold-blooded serial killer? You’re kidding, right?”

“Not at all,” Sherlock assured him. “She was the mastermind behind the whole kidnapping affair. She wanted her freedom and she wanted money – lots of it – and she wasn’t willing to share.”

“And we could never prove any of it,” Lestrade added sourly. “Only Cartwright knew about her part in the scheme, and he swore high and holy that she’d been an innocent victim, cause he still believed that she’d break him out of prison and they’ll start a new life together.”

“Idiot!” Sherlock commented scathingly. “As if a girl like her, born to big money, bright, ruthless and determined, would have _anything_ to do with a petty criminal like him! She only kept feeding lies to him in prison cause she knew he’d tell the others about their so-called plans and the others, quite rightly I’m afraid, would realise that they won’t see a single penny upon their release. Oh, she’s good. She’s more than good, she’s brilliant!”

“Well, not so brilliant after all, seeing how we’ve caught her and all that,” Donovan commented, but Sherlock waved off her comment.

“Technicalities. The plan, Sally, the plan was pure genius, don’t you see? She could be certain that her father would pay, so she had the money. She’d had Cartwright wrapped around her finger so completely that he killed Mr. Tobin for her without a second thought… or a first one, considering what an idiot he was. So she had the unwanted suitor, the one chosen by her father to run the bank after his death, out of her hair. Sir William had a weak heart, two failed bypasses, it was reasonable to assume that after such dramatic events he’d suffer a lethal heart attack, which he conveniently had, right after the gang’s trial, so she had her freedom, too, at last.”

“She planned the death of her own father cold-bloodedly?” Mike gasped.

Sherlock shrugged. “Why not? The old man didn’t care for _her_ wishes, either. She was not willing to become a pawn in the game to save the bank. She never cared about the bank, which, by the way, tethered at the edge of financial collapse already; so she simply removed the unnecessary pieces from the board.”

There was such coldness in his voice that the others began to shiver.

“And people wonder why I hate working with psychopaths,” Donovan muttered, shooting him a dirty look.

“Sociopath,” Sherlock corrected coldly. “A high-functioning one, for which your incompetent, idiotic lot should be grateful.”

“But I still don’t understand how Miss Grosvenor… I mean, Miss Worthingdon could strangulate four grown men, one of them as big an oaf as this fake Russian,” Mike said hurriedly, before Donovan could have hit Sherlock, which seemed a distinct possibility at the moment. “It seems impossible to me. That would require great physical strength.”

“Not if she used a garrotte,” Sherlock said. “Have you ever seen a garrotte? It is basically a hand-held ligature of chain, rope, wire, scarf or fishing line used to strangle a person. Well, wire in our case. A stick may be used to tighten the garrotte; Miss Worthingdon’s weapon was custom-made, with a comfortable handle on each end of the wire, making it easy to handle and very efficient. When the victim is clueless and the murderer quick, it can be over within ten seconds. So, you see,” he concluded triumphantly, “it’s a murder weapon eminently practical for the female use – or for people without considerable strength.”

“Thank you,” Mike said dryly. “It’s comforting to know that I used to have a seemingly harmless receptionist willing and able to murder men twice her size with a piece of wire. I feel much better now.”

“She needed help with hanging them properly, of course,” Sherlock continued, ignoring him, “and that’s where our Mr. Percy Ward comes into the picture. He was actually very fond of Cartwright and thought that the others have deserved their fate for betraying and killing his nephew, respectively.”

“Until he realised how Miss Worthingdon had been using him all the time,” Lestrade added, ”in which moment he almost suffered a _genuine_ cataleptic attack.”

“What will happen with all the money in the safe?” Donovan asked. “With the bank gone, the two hundred thousand pounds would go to the clients to compensate them for their losses, I assume, but what about the rest?”

“Theoretically it would belong to Dr. Stamford,” Lestrade asked. “It’s _his_ money, after all. That fact would be hard to prove, though, I’m afraid, as there’s only proof for it being given to him by his patients but not that Sutton took it from him afterwards.”

“Well, I couldn’t exactly demand a written contract, even if he'd been willing to set up one,” Mike said glumly. “The whole agreement was... unusual, to say the least.”

“Oh, don’t be so dim-witted!” Sherlock closed his eyes as if such amount of stupidity had been painful for him to watch. “You can prove the income, right? You do have everything in your books, don’t you?”

“Yes, but…”

“No buts. You can prove a certain amount of money being given to you. Now, if you say that Sutton – whom you thought to be a genuine patient – put it in his safe for you, cause of all those burglaries in West End, who can prove you false?”

“The Freak does have a point,” Donovan admitted reluctantly. “As long as you don’t claim more than that which stands in your books, Dr. Stamford, nobody can take from you the money that is rightfully yours. You’ve earned it honestly, after all. And now that you’ll have to pay the rent and the bills yourself you’ll sorely need it, too.”

“Unless you want to move the practice to a less expensive neighbourhood,” Lestrade added.

“I would, were it up to me,” Mike confessed. “But my patients would hardly follow me somewhere else, and I’ve got a certain reputation to protect. So I’ll have to see how I can solve the financial problems long-term. Getting my money back would help to bridge over the first months indeed.”

“You can always get a flatshare,” Sherlock suggested. “You’re the type who’d enjoy having somebody in the house. Having tea together… going to a pub… watching crap telly… that sort of thing.”

Mike raised an eyebrow. “Are you volunteering?”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Sherlock replied without opening his eyes. “I’d die from boredom within a week in such a dull neighbourhood. Besides, who’d want _me_ as a flatmate? Not even my landlords can tolerate me longer than a few months.”

“Yeah; one has to wonder why,” Donovan commented dryly. Sherlock ignored her as per usual.

“Well, I must be off,” he suddenly declared, jumping to his feet with renewed energy. “That ninja butler of my brother apparently found a potential new flat for me; and since he’s a pedantic idiot, I must take a look myself before I’d make up my mind. Good-bye, Lestrade; should you get a case that isn’t painfully boring, you know where you find me.”

And with that, he strode out with long, purposeful strides, coattails fluttering after him.

“ _Ninja_ butler?” Donovan repeated with a perplexed expression.

Mike shook his head. “Don’t even try to understand. I’ve given up making any sense of him when he was five.”

~TBC~


	14. Inventory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The various artefacts on Ianto’s inventory list have been identified courtesy of the Props list on the Sherlockology website. This part is an interlude, leading on to canon events.

**INVENTORY**

“How is the 221B project going?” Mycroft Holmes asked from his butler… archivist… librarian… whatever, who’d come to fetch him from the _Diogenes Club_.

“Excellently, sir,” Ianto politely held the door for him open, so that he could settle in comfortably. “Mrs. Hudson was more than willing to let me move the things of your…” he paused for a significant moment before continuing, “ _brother_ into the flat already. She might even be gently persuaded to allow us to replace that truly awful mauve wallpaper in the living room, as long as she wouldn’t have to pay for the redecoration.”

“Consider it covered,” Mycroft said in a somewhat bored tone; then a warning glance appeared in his eyes. “And be watchful with those emphatic little pauses of yours. Sherlock will notice them. He’s not an idiot, you know.”

“If you say so, sir,” Ianto replied with bland disinterest.

Mycroft closed his eyes for a moment. He had nothing against a well-nurtured grudge, but Ianto really needed to be more subtle about it. Not that people would wonder why he disliked Sherlock – he wouldn’t be the only one – but they would wonder why he, as Sherlock’s brother tolerated such a behaviour from the side of someone who worked for the family.

“Do you have a list of the items that supposedly have belonged to Sherlock for a decade?” he then asked, deciding to discuss Ianto’s behaviour in depth another time.

Ianto wordlessly handed his boss his smartphone with said list displayed on the small screen before starting the engine. There was, most efficiently, a picture linked to each item on the list, sparing Mycroft the necessity to physically take a look at them – _or_ at the flat itself.

“A Prior ZoomMaster65 microscope,” Mycroft murmured. “Base model… good choice, very good choice indeed. There are fancier models, but with a magnification between 3.5x and 225x, coupled with the choice of three different base stands, one can study almost any specimen with this one.”

“Sometimes you just can’t beat the classics, sir,” Ianto commented.

“Very true,” Mycroft scrolled down the list, ignoring such irrelevant things as furniture, floor lamps and mirrors. Then something small-ish caught his eye. “A _black_ globe? That’s unusual.”

“It’s free spinning and very decorative, sir,” Ianto pointed out the advantages of said item. “And the dial on top allows one to calculate daylight hours around the world, which is suitably useful for detective work, I’m told. Besides, shouldn’t be a Time Lord – even a former one – always conscious of, you know, _time_?”

Mycroft closed his eyes for a painful moment. “Mr. Jones, has anyone told you that your sense of humour is of the most atrocious sort?”

Ianto shrugged. “Jack seemed to like it, sir.”

“Yes, well, I’d thank you if you didn’t compare _me_ with Jack Harkness, Captain of the worst puns and innuendo,” Mycroft said dryly. “And while we’re at it, what’s moved you to purchase a bust of Goethe for my brother?”

“I thought he’d perhaps identify with Goethe’s renown as a polymath, since he seems to believe he knows everything better than other people,” Ianto replied. “I also got him an annotated copy of Goethe’s _The Theory of Colours_ , in which the author examines the reactions and perceptions of humans to colour. Thought he might find it interesting.”

“I see,” Mycroft said slowly. “You _are_ aware of the fact, of course, that Gallifreyans have different perceptions of light and colour?”

“Quite so, sir,” Ianto said. “But you’ve both got human bodies now. Knowing how he’s _supposed_ to react might help him to actually _do_ so, even if his subconscious happens to send him different signals.”

“That’s an excellent idea,” Mycroft admitted, slightly annoyed that it hadn’t come from him. “And I like the periodic table and the photo of Mendeleyev. Nice touch. Nice touch indeed.”

“Well, you gave him an avid interest in chemistry, sir,” Ianto reminded him, “not to mention a somewhat explosive history of disastrous experiments. I just added the background details.”

“Well done, Mr. Jones, well done,” Mycroft scrolled further down, frowned and took a second look at the next item. “Can you tell me what on Earth is a bison skull doing mounted on the wall of my brother’s future living room? A _black_ bison skull, wearing _headphones_?”

Ianto chuckled. “Anthea had to hide the surveillance cameras _somewhere_ , sir.”

“I hate to point out the obvious to you, but that’s probably the first place where he’ll be checking,” Mycroft said.

“Exactly,” Ianto replied. “Which is why the actual surveillance devices – tiny little Torchwood-issue ones – are hidden within the skull itself, providing us with an almost 360-degree view of the living room through the eye and nose openings.”

“You’re a sneaky bastard, Ianto,” Mycroft said with a touch of genuine admiration.

He could see Ianto’s smile in the side mirror. “I do my best, sir.”

“How did you get a _black_ bison skull anyway?” Mycroft then asked.

Ianto smiled again. “It was a fairly ordinary skull when I purchased it online, sir. We had to spray it black, though, with a special isolation layer, so that interferences from the telly or the mobile phones won’t compromise the working of the cameras.”

“Good thinking,” Mycroft gave the portable, wide-screen Samsung LE 32B450 LCD-TV an appreciating glance. “Nice telly, by the way.”

“Thank you, sir. Some of the old furniture from the main living room has been moved downstairs to the 221C flat, as it wasn’t fitting for a young man. After the suicide/murder case it’s unlikely that Mrs. Hudson would be able to rent the flat out for a while anyway. And if she can, at least there would be a couple of comfortable armchairs that previously weren’t.”

“Good,” Mycroft said. “Has my dear brother agreed to take the flat? He can be… obnoxious sometimes, just to be contrary.”

“There are things not even the chameleon arch can change, I see,” Ianto replied with a grim smile. “He didn’t give me a final answer yet. I think mostly because he’s reluctant to accept financial help from you and can’t touch his funds without your approval. But he seemed to like the place, so it’s a question of finding a suitable flatmate, I think.”

“In which case we should keep a close watch on all potential candidates,” Mycroft said.

Ianto nodded. “But of course, sir. Mummy and Anthea are looking into it. Having control over the whole CCTV network is such a useful thing. Even if it is, you know, basically illegal.”

“Legality is fluid,” Mycroft replied airily.

As the traffic lights had just turned red and he had to stop the car anyway, Ianto allowed himself to turn back and give his boss a direct look. A rather sober one.

“That’s exactly what worries me, sir,” he said. “Wasn’t that how Torchwood fell? A precedence has already been made; what makes you sure that you’ll always be able to keep things under control?”

~The End - for now~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of this installment. The story will be continued in "A Study in Pink".


End file.
